HOST/PRODUCER – SEAN MALLEN
Ottawa’s Ethics Debate
GUESTS:
Conservative MP for Peterborough – Dean Del Mastro
Liberal MP for Ajax-Pickering – Mark Holland, MP for Ajax-Pickering
NDP MP for Trinity-Spadina – Olivia Chow, MP for Trinity-Spadina
Global News Parliamentary Bureau Chief – Jacques Bourbeau
Gilles Bisson – NDP MPP
National Post Columnist – John Ivison
SEAN MALLEN: Here’s an evocative word, brinkmanship. It’s defined as pushing a risky situation to the limit of safety. I looked up the origin the other day and it comes from the Cold War. The former Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson seems to be the first to use it. In 1956 he criticized the Secretary of State for brinkmanship, for pushing the U.S. and the Soviet Union close to the nuclear abyss.
Now as much as things are heated in Ottawa these days, no one’s comparing it to the threat of thermal nuclear war, but events could conspire to lead to a political disaster for somebody.
(video clip)
So much ado over three little letters, n – o – t, the “˜not’ that mysteriously appeared in a letter from International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda, denying funding to an aid group.
Michael Ignatieff, Liberal Leader: She did not tell the truth; she did not have the integrity to resign. How could the Prime Minister not demand her resignation.
The government stood fast behind Oda.
John Baird, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons: She’s done a fantastic job and Canada is awfully lucky to have her.
But that wasn’t all that has voices raised on Parliament Hill. There’s Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, who fired an aide after a fund-raising request was sent on ministerial letterhead.
There’s the on-going controversy over Elections Canada charges against the Tories over fund-raising. And then this week Speaker Peter Milliken issued two scorching rulings against the Tories, saying there’s evidence Oda did mislead Parliament and that the government improperly withheld information about the costs of its justice policies.
The Speaker (Hon Peter Milliken): And this is a serious matter that goes to the heart of the House’s undoubted role in holding the government to account.
The Prime Minister seemed unconcerned.
Hon Stephen Harper: You win some, you lose some. If you lose you comply and that’s what we’ll do, but you know as they say, that’s just parliamentary debate. What we remain focussed on as the government are the big issues, like the economy, creating jobs …
Jack Layton, NDP Leader: It looks as though he’s lost his ability to distinguish right from wrong.
And suddenly there’s talk that the government might fall, not over the budget, but over ethics and accountability.
Michael Ignatieff, Liberal Leader: I’m not looking for an election, but if you treat the Canadian people with that kind of contempt, if you say democracy is a little distraction, it doesn’t matter to you, look out!
This week on Focus Ontario – On The Brink.
From the Global News room in Toronto, this is Focus Ontario with Sean Mallen.
SEAN MALLEN: Thanks for joining me again. Later in the program I’ll ask a couple of colleagues from the Parliamentary Press Gallery for their thoughts on all this. But first, three Ontario MP’s. In our Ottawa bureau is Dean Del Mastro, the Conservative member for Peterborough; and Olivia Chow, a New Democrat who represents Trinity-Spadina. And here with me in Toronto is Mark Holland, the Liberal member for Ajax-Pickering. Welcome to Focus Ontario all of you.
Mark Holland: Thanks Sean.
SEAN MALLEN: Let’s start in Ottawa with Mr Del Mastro, and I’m going to get opinions from all of you on this, and this is on the subject of the Speaker’s ruling, Mr Del Mastro. It seems on the face pretty serious, I mean it’s getting close to finding the government in contempt of parliament. But the Prime Minister just said “˜you win some, you lose some’ and it’s all kind of in-house kind of stuff. Do you think it’s really not so serious as that?
Dean Del Mastro: Well, first of all let’s be clear. We’re going to respect the rulings of the Speaker. We’re going to see what we can do to provide some additional information, specifically with the requests on costing; and Minister Oda has in fact made herself available to the committees and she’s going to do that again. So we’re going to do our best to comply with the Speaker’s ruling, we respect it. But let’s be clear, you know the opposition running around with their hair on fire, trying to turn committees, and indeed the House of Commons itself, into a kangaroo court. I think that’s completely detached from the lives of everyday Canadians you know who are worried about things like jobs, the price of gas for example. These are big topics and we see a terrible disaster in Japan. Real life is happening out there and the opposition, I think their narrative is frankly not in touch with Canadians.
SEAN MALLEN: But isn’t this pretty serious stuff in its way, though? I mean the Speaker is an impartial person, seems to have the respect of all sides of the House, and he’s basically come close to saying a minister mislead the House, that’s serious stuff, isn’t it?
Dean Del Mastro: Well again, I think the Minister has been pretty clear. She’s always indicated that she made the decision herself, that in fact she made the decision based on the information that had been provided to her. The opposition parties will have an opportunity to question her again. And you know I totally support Bev, I think she’s done an outstanding job delivering results for impoverished people around the world and getting value for Canadian taxpayer dollars that are going into foreign aid. When we put this money in place in the first place we expect to get results with it, and that’s what she’s doing.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, let me get the opposition’s take on this. I am going to start with you, Mr Holland. I mean jobs – meat and potatoes issues – surely more important than this kind of stuff in parliament, don’t you think?
Mark Holland: Well Sean, so is democracy, and the bottom line is we have a government that’s not being straightforward either to Parliament or the Canadian people. You know you take the issue of their prison agenda, their chasing after the disaster that was California. We’ve been asking for years the cost of these bills. They gave us one bill and said it was $90 million. The parliamentary budget officer revealed it was between $10 – $13 billion. We’ve got another 24 bills on the table. This is a government that’s racked up the biggest deficit in Canadian history. We deserve to know those numbers surely, and not be forced to vote in the dark; and secondly, to stand behind a minister, who on one day says she doesn’t know how a document got doctored, and the other day said she directed it. You know one day she’s saying it was the department’s idea, the other day she’s saying it was her idea, and then they stand up and call her courageous.
And then we’ve got an Immigration Minister going across the country looking like he’s trying to turn his position into a fund-raising tool for the Conservative Party of Canada. I mean it just starts adding up and up and up.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, so ready to fight an election over it? Better for a non-confidence vote on this issue, these issues collectively?
Mark Holland: I think when you take a look at this long litany, and also the killing of all of the independent voices, whether or not it’s the RCMP public complaints commissioner, the nuclear safety commissioner, the military public complaints commissioner, and the list goes on and on and on. Any time somebody stands up to them, asks questions and demands more information, they get fired. So I think look, we’re at the point where if they don’t come in and make radical changes here, watch out. There’s absolutely no way we can allow this kind of erosion of our democracy, this attack of our independent institutions, and such a disrespect, fundamental disrespect, for our democracy.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, I want to give Ms Chow a chance at this. Ms Chow, the NDP may have a choice pretty soon if the Liberals come forward with a non-confidence motion on these issues. Would you support a non-confidence motion on this, ready to go to the people on these issues?
Olivia Chow: Well Sean, you have seen a pattern. The Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, when he doesn’t like what’s happening in Parliament, he goes and prorogues parliament and padlocks the doors. If he doesn’t like the election laws, he goes and breaks them, and overspent close to a million dollars and came up with a scheme that systematically belayed the election law, and have been found by the federal court to do so with charges pending, and when he doesn’t like the truth he doesn’t tell Canadians or parliament or any member of parliament what precisely is the cost, whether it’s the fighter jets or the prisons.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, that’s the list, but are you ready to go to the people on it.
Olivia Chow: There are more, there are more.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, but the question is are you ready to fight an election on these issues?
Olivia Chow: Well, at the end of the day democracy is very, very important. It’s also important that we take a look at the budget, and is there money to help the seniors to make sure that they can retire securely, they can pay the rent and not have to turn off the heat; is there money to hire more doctors and nurses, because right now five million Canadians have no family doctor.
SEAN MALLEN: It sounds like the NDP wants to see the budget – a quick answer if I could – and potentially, if you get what you want, at least vote for the budget, yes?
Olivia Chow: Well, next week is the break week. The Liberals, every second day, say oh, your time’s up, or watch out and who knows what they’re going to do. They have one day to do it, i.e., Monday, which is the 21st. Will they actually do something? Who knows, because there’s been a lot of talk and not a lot of action from the Liberals at this point.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, I am going to stop you there and save some time for our second segment. Be back in a moment. * * *
SEAN MALLEN: And welcome back to our conversation with three Ontario MP’s. I’ll start with the Liberal, Mark Holland here. The interesting that came out from the Jason Kenney issue, setting aside the ethical issues, it kind of opened the door to some Conservative plans to go after so-called ethnic communities, especially around Toronto. How much is that a threat to the Liberals, he’s basically going after Liberal seats in that regard.
Mark Holland: Well, I think it’s going to backfire on them in the hugest way. I mean look at this document, it talks about the very ethnic communities, and then in a very cynical way it talks about playing games with them, not really addressing underlying issues, but treating them like a political football, and the notion that a minister – I mean remember this is a minister of the crown – going into rooms with the authority of an Immigration Minister, somebody who can make a decision whether or not a loved one from another country comes here, or whether or not someone is sent away and deported – is sitting in a room holding fund-raisers with new Canadians.
SEAN MALLEN: The Liberals never did that when they were immigration ministers.
Mark Holland: Well, I think never, never like this. I mean I think you’re seeing it on a level that is spectacularly out of control. This Minister is so politicizing that office, using it with Conservative banners, Conservative balloons, going into events being hyper-partisan. It’s on a level that we’ve never seen before, and I think it’s enormously inappropriate, but I think it speaks to a broader trend, Sean, and that is a government that is using all of its levers, all its levers of power as if it was the Conservative Party of Canada, and they’re doing that with spending millions and millions of taxpayers’ dollars in commercials, to promote them, they’re doing it in allowing the bureaucracy to only use their talking points. People like Munir Sheikh, the head of Statistics Canada, thrown out unless he spoke their talking points. They’re taking full control over every aspect of government.
SEAN MALLEN: Let me draw Olivia Chow into this. Ms Chow, what about the Tory tactics of reaching out to these communities? I mean surely isn’t it not the job of political parties to reach out to all communities, and try to touch them and reach out to their needs?
Olivia Chow: Well, the word is “˜needs’, reaching out to their needs and then taking action so that they don’t have to wait for over ten years to bring their parents from overseas to Canada. But that’s not what’s happening. It’s really going out and doing token, giving out moon cakes, red packets at New Year’s time to get votes. So it’s different. One is hearing their needs and the other is really doing something for them, and every party should be listening to the voices of new Canadians. What I have noticed though is that the Conservatives are copying what the Liberals used to do, because I was at a meeting quite a few years ago where a Liberal member of parliament was out there asking people to join the Liberal Party in order for them at that time to vote for Paul Martin in the leadership bid, in order to get access to the MP. So I’ve seen this from the Liberals, and now I’m seeing it from the Conservatives and at some point they should stop treating new Canadians as just basically people they can get votes from, that they can get money from because it’s fund-raising.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, if I might, I just want to keep moving on because our time is short. There’s a very pertinent issue for the NDP that a lot of people are raising, which is election readiness, and to the point, election readiness from your leader, just coming back from a broken hip, an operation just last week. The leader happens to be your husband, that’s a pretty serious thing to go on a national campaign so quickly after such a kind of surgery, isn’t it?
Olivia Chow: You saw Jack Layton standing up in the House of Commons on Wednesday night voting for the NDP bill to support drugs to go to Africa to stop the kids from dying. You saw him in the House of Commons Thursday asking questions to the Prime Minister, doing a scrum afterwards, we are ready for a campaign, our plane is ready.
SEAN MALLEN: Is he ready, I mean physically?
Olivia Chow: Oh absolutely.
SEAN MALLEN: Setting aside politics this is a big physical thing he’s just gone through, and elections are tough.
Olivia Chow: He is a very active person, he’s in very good shape. He has always worked out, so it’s a minor setback in terms of hip surgery, but hundreds and hundreds of Canadians do this surgery, and he’s up and walking with a cane you know, but no problem doing a campaign.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, we might find out shortly. Mr Del Mastro, what’s your response to these complaints about the Tories cynically approaching ethnic communities, especially in the Toronto area?
Dean Del Mastro: Well listen, let’s be clear, Jason Kenney is the hardest working member of parliament in any party, period, and I challenge anyone to point to anyone who works more hours. He has a passion for what he’s doing. He has a real affection for new Canadians; he works hard on their behalf, he’s supporting them in the communities where they live. And frankly one message we want to convey as Conservatives quite separately is you know here’s our values, and we think that they align very closely with your values, we believe in family, we believe in opportunity, the creation of jobs, we believe in low taxes, we believe in entrepreneurship. These are things that align very closely to the values of new Canadians, and we want to get that message out to them. We believe that we are the party that best represents them.
SEAN MALLEN: Forgive me for interrupting, just thirty seconds left, a quick answer if I might. I asked the Prime Minister on this the other day, didn’t get a straight answer, let me ask you, are you ready to run an election based on ethics and accountability, not so much on the economy, which is what your opponents seem to want to do? Ready to run on those?
Dean Del Mastro: Well, if you’re asking me I think it’s not in the interests of Canadians to go to an election right now. It’s a minority parliament, you always have to be ready, but I think we’re going to have a very important budget, we’re creating jobs in this country, we’re focusing on the economy, that’s where the interests and concerns of Canadians are and that’s where we’re going to stay focussed.
Mark Holland: So the answer is no.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, well we all might find out very soon. Anyway, thank you all for coming on the program – Olivia Chow, Dean Del Mastro in Ottawa, Mark Holland here in Toronto. And back in a moment to hear the view from the Press Gallery.
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SEAN MALLEN: It was just about two months ago that my next two guests were on the program saying they were sceptical that an election was imminent. Time for an update, Jacques Bourbeau is Global’s Parliamentary Bureau Chief; John Ivison writes a column for the National Post. Good to see you both again, gentlemen, and time for an update, so start with you, Jacques. An election any more likely now than what you thought in January?
Jacques Bourbeau: Well, perhaps a bit more, but I’m still a bit sceptical that we’re going to go, and frankly it’s because there doesn’t seem to be the energy that I’ve seen in past election run-ups amongst the parties to go to the polls. What I’m encountering more is that well, I guess if we have to, we’re ready and we’ll go if we have to go, but it doesn’t seem that there’s that real push of energy where you just know in your bones that we’re going to have an election.
SEAN MALLEN: What do you think, John, any more likely now than in January?
John Ivison: I’m with Jacques on that. I mean we’re probably very much in a minority because I think most people here think we’re going, and these things do tend to generate their own momentum at some point. You know you mobilize to such an extent. It’s like the summer of 1914, you know we end up going to war that nobody wants. But I’m still sceptical because at the end of the day it’s not in the NDP’s interests to go, they are probably going to lose seats if the polls are to be believed, and I still believe that turkeys don’t vote for Christmas.
SEAN MALLEN: Let’s talk about in terms of scenarios that might see us going. Off camera Mark Holland was telling me to watch the week of the budget. They obviously don’t have any votes on the budget that week, but there could be some resolutions. John, what kind of scenario could see us go that week, or go period?
John Ivison: Well, there’s a potential for a confidence vote on the Monday, Liberal Opposition Day, but I don’t think the NDP will support that because they want to see what’s in the budget. If you have a confidence vote and it’s successful, then we don’t even get to the budget being tabled, never mind voted upon. So then after that there are amendments, there are sub-amendments, and a week after the budget we have the ways and means motion, this is the budget vote. So in there, there are three or four opportunities for the government to be brought down. I think if the budget has something big for the NDP or the Bloc, none of those are going to be successful.
Jacques Bourbeau: I think a non-confidence motion would be a way to try to box the NDP into defeating the government because of ethical issues. But the fact is if there is something in that budget that the NDP really likes, then they have a narrative that they can try to sell, which is look these are just games being played by the other parties, there’s something substantial in that budget for Canadians that we like, that we endorse, and as a result of that we’re going to support the government.
SEAN MALLEN: Jacques, one theory I’ve heard is that the Liberals are now energized by this confluence of different ethical kinds of issues coming together with sort of non-partisan sources supporting it, and there’s a thought there that maybe they should try to go on this because the economy is bouncing back and this might well be a good news budget. Anything to that do you think?
Jacques Bourbeau: Well, certainly the Tories think that the economy, if that is the issue of the campaign, that it plays to them. And so the Liberals, this has kind of fallen in their lap, and certainly what I’ve noticed is that when Michael Ignatieff is in the House of Commons during Question Period, talking about what he calls the democratic deficit, and Stephen Harper’s lack of respect for parliamentary democracy, that’s when Ignatieff gets really energized and quite animated and full of energy. The problem I think for the Liberals is going to be will voters get equally energized, are they as upset and concerned about those sort of issues as Michael Ignatieff and the Liberals are.
SEAN MALLEN: John, you made a point in the Friday column that the polls have been consistent, the most recent ones, still have double digit lead for the Conservatives, but you’re starting to wonder, and at least ponder, I guess maybe the Liberals are too, whether some of these other issues related to ethics, are starting to stick. Do you think they might?
John Ivison: Yes, well I think it will take a while for them to percolate. You know I think the Liberals should be commended for learning the art of opposition at long last. They asked for the Speaker’s ruling, they asked for the parliamentary budget office to look at the cost of the planes. This is an issue which they’ve prompted. You know they’ve finally found some game at last, and I think you know they could never win on the economy. They could get some traction on this although it would have to be a lot of traction for them to defeat the Conservatives. I don’t particularly see that at the moment.
SEAN MALLEN: Just twenty seconds left, John. Do you think the Liberals are really united on the need to go on this? Mr Holland seems to be, but do you think there’s some weakness in there?
John Ivison: Yes, there are a lot of MP’s who are sceptical about going, and you know a lot of them potentially are going to lose their seats, but I think they’re going to have to go some time, and this is probably as good a time as any for them.
SEAN MALLEN: Okay, well I think we should be finding out pretty soon, and we’ll have you back on when and if that happens. John Ivison, Jacques Bourbeau, thanks for coming back on the program.
Guests: Thank you.
SEAN MALLEN: And one final segment to go on Focus, with your comments and the Play of the Week – Say What?
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Play of the Week
(video clip – Ontario legislature)
Sometimes I like to kid cabinet ministers about how their principal task in any media interview is to not actually say anything newsworthy, or in some cases not anything understandable. Have a look at this example:
Energy policy can be arcane at the best of times. This week the NDP was rolling out evidence that smart meters are actually costing homeowners more than the old meters, a charge Energy Minister Brad Duguid denied, but in his scrum afterwards he lost us with the explanation:
Brad Duguid, Minister of Energy: On average the consumers are saving modestly, and I’ve used the word modestly, but there are more that would be paying a little bit more, and there are less that would be paying significantly less, if you know what I mean. It’s a little complicated.
There will be a test on that one later.
– – –
And now your comments, and last week’s program was all about the spraying of Agent Orange in Ontario. It prompted a viewer named Norman to fire off an e-mail. He writes: “Just wanted to send a note to say that there have been other spray programs in the province. Has anyone thought about the insect aerial spray programs that have occurred in this province to control spruce budworm, or gypsy moth.”
Got a comment on what you’ve seen – possibility of a federal election. Well, you can write me a letter to:
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And that’s our program for this week. I’m Sean Mallen; thanks for watching and for your patience with our changeable time slot. We’ll be returning to Saturdays full-time in June. Next weekend, Sunday at 7 a.m. and midnight. Hope to see you then.
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